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A sign on Liberty Avenue in Ocean Breeze is pictured as hundred of people in New York City affected by Hurricane Sandy, including Staten Island, have not signed up for the NYC Build it Back program. Monday Septmeber 23, 2013. (Staten Island Advance/Anthony DePrimo)
(Staten Island Advance/Anthony DePrimo)

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- Mayoral candidate Bill de Blasio's pitch to use federal relief money to create living-wage jobs, affordable housing and community health care centers isn't going over well with some Staten Island lawmakers, who say those scrambling to get back into their homes need to be priority one.

Rep. Michael Grimm slammed the Democrat de Blasio's "scheme" as the reason many House Republicans didn't want to approve the relief aid for the city -- fear that it would be put into a mayoral "slush fund" for unrelated things.

"To talk of using Sandy funds to build low-income housing at a time when the people of Staten Island have yet to receive Build it Back funds or when our coastline is far from protected is completely asinine!" Grimm (R-Staten Island/Brooklyn) said in a statement. "Fortunately, this misguided idea is dead before it starts because de Blasio would be violating the intent of the law by any attempt to misuse funds."

But de Blasio, who made his remarks about Sandy funding on Sunday in the Rockaways, said it isn't a matter of choosing one priority over the other.

"These priorities aren't mutually exclusive. This is about making a resilient and durable recovery," de Blasio told the Advance through a spokesman. "Of course, we'll prioritize rebuilding homes, but we can help entire communities recover more fully by ensuring that our reconstruction and resiliency dollars are utilized in a way that supports living wages."

"The wages associated with our reconstruction work are recirculated in our local economies - helping Sandy-ravaged local economies to rebound more quickly," he continued.

Still, city officials running the Build it Back program have cautioned that there just isn't enough relief money in the federal government's first allocation to help every homeowner who needs to repair or rebuild her home, be reimbursed for fixes she made or elevate to avoid future flood insurance hikes.

Grimm said de Blasio should come to him if he wants rebuilding ideas -- he said he could bring de Blasio to many residents who still aren't home, or who haven't reopened businesses, or are awaiting the reopening of the New Dorp Beach Friendship Club.

City Councilman James Oddo, meanwhile, said he was already in the process last week of setting up an Island meeting with de Blasio on Sandy issues. If both Oddo (R=Mid-Island/Brooklyn) and de Blasio wage successful campaigns this November, they'd be working together as borough president and mayor.

"I will bring Bill to speak to the folks from Ocean Breeze. They will tell Bill, in no uncertain terms, what their needs are, and they will do it respectfully but they will do it chapter and verse," Oddo said.

Oddo said he doesn't know exactly what de Blasio's "greater good" vision was for the money, but he believes he could make de Blasio "fully understand" what Sandy victims in the borough need and want.

"It's gonna be a year later, and to say people are frustrated doesn't do it justice -- they're beyond frustrated," Oddo said.

But Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis (R-East Shore/Brooklyn) said de Blasio was "completely out of touch" with the needs of Staten Islanders. Any attempts to "further his progressive liberal agenda" with the money, she said, is "completely misguided and, I think, just plain insensitive."

The Sandy relief funds were allocated for getting people back in their homes, covering what FEMA or insurance didn't pay for and protecting the coastline from future deadly storms, she said.

"These are people's hard-earned tax dollars, and they're allocated for a purpose," she said. "That's what it should be used for -- it should not be raided and taken to be used for other purposes, especially the purposes he cites."

Councilman Vincent Ignizio (R-South Shore) said he, too, dpesn't know what de Blasio's full plans are -- but he doesn't like the sounds of them.

"The discussion for Sandy recovery and Sandy relief was about people who suffered enormously the destruction of their homes -- and to throw that in the same pot as, 'We want to pursue affordable housing,' is just insensitive to those who lost so much," Ignizio said.

He, too, urged de Blasio to come to the borough -- the candidate and current public advocate has made just one visit, to a county Democratic convention, since becoming the nominee -- and tour Sandy areas so he could rethink his proposals.